Feature tour · 10 of 16
Webcam
The tablet's camera, in every app that asks for one
A tablet you have paired becomes a camera the Mac can use. macOS lists it under the device's own name with "(Decky Cam)" after it, so FaceTime, Zoom, Chrome and Photo Booth find it in the list they already have. Over the cable or over WiFi, either way.
On the list, beside the built-in one
Any application that can pick a camera can pick this one, because nothing about it is special from the outside. macOS asks once for permission, in System Settings, and after that it is simply on the list.
The sensor opens when an app opens it
Connecting a tablet does not start its camera. The sensor opens when an application on the Mac opens the camera and shuts when the last one lets go, so the light on the tablet tracks what is really happening rather than what is merely plugged in.
Aimed from the Mac, with the picture in front of you
Lens, size, framing, rotation, zoom, pan, mirroring and lens distortion are all set from the Mac, per device, with the camera live in the same panel while you change them. A crop you cannot see is a crop you are guessing at.
Every control is that device's own
The lens rows are the lenses the tablet reported. The sizes are the rungs that lens can actually feed, and the zoom slider stops where the lens stops.
Only a trusted device may hand one over
Somebody who joined a Room with a Room code may watch what is on the wall. Giving the Mac a camera takes a paired device, and a Mac that refuses says why instead of leaving a tablet streaming into nothing with its light on.
A screen and a camera at the same time
The camera has its own place on the connection instead of borrowing the one the screen uses, so a tablet can show your desktop and be your camera at once. Neither has to stop for the other.